Saturday, November 29, 2008

Was glued to the TV the third day in a row, when my son asked me, “Mamma, when will your programme end?”The answer he wanted was, “in a few minutes, and after that, you can watch Power Rangers.”But what really was the answer?“In a few hours”, the TV channels had been assuring us for the past 36 hours.“By the end of the day”, was a fairly realistic answer.“Never!”, though, is the most appropriate answer.Because none of this will ever end till every single one of us takes responsibility for bringing about change. Will we?

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Friday, November 28, 2008

Fifty-seven killed on the platform of Victoria Terminus. Diners at a restaurant, gunning down everyone after finishing a meal. A police van highjacked and its occupants killed in full view of video cameras. Guests at five-star hotels being forced to barricade themselves in their rooms and survive on the contents of the room-bar. A taxi blowing up moments after jumping a traffic-light. Women and children taken hostage at a government hospital. Sniffer-dogs gunned down.

Every Mumbaikar knows the many ways in which he is vulnerable. Can we ever stop looking over out shoulders?

Will life ever be the same again?

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

Mumbai, we always knew was the next target for a terrorist attack. We expected the serial bombs to strike almost any day. We were extra vigilant– once I had been evacuated from a shopping mall, I never stopped eyeing every seemingly abandoned package suspiciously, I saw a lady get off a train just to report a suspicious laptop. I trusted our Eyes and Ears. Because we are the next target, we would never actually come under attack, I thought.Then last night, the hubby came home telling me of how a taxi-bomb went off under a flyover while he was waiting at the nearest traffic light to get under it. He’d seen the police taking charge and cordoning off the entire area.“Is it now Mumbai’s turn, or was that just an isolated incident?”, we wondered as we switched on the television. The news channels were full of it – blasts at VT station, shooting at the Taj and Trident hotels, reports of violence from other places.“This doesn’t seem to be too serious”, I thought; images of bombs going off at crowded places during peak hours still fresh in my mind. Sure there were many incidents of violence, but where was the panic, the visuals of the dead and wounded being taken away from the blast sites, the relatives crying into microphones while searching for their loved ones? Firing in the lobbies of five-star hotels late at night seemed very tame in comparison.If the purpose of terrorism was to strike fear into everyone’s heart, to have people constantly looking over their shoulder wondering if they would be next, then this attack has definitely failed, I thought naively as I finally dragged myself away from the television and into bed.

This morning, I slept a few minutes longer than I normally do because I knew I would not be sending the kids to school for at least a day. When I stumbled to the television and turned on the news channel, the news was the same, but the tone of reporting had changed. The terrorists who had holed up in the hotels were not there seeking shelter as I had previously assumed – they had taken hostage the guests and the hotel staff. It was an attack of terrorism the kind of which India has never witnessed in the past.

The profile of the victims had changed – not innocent middle class shoppers, but high spending foreign tourists and people at the highest echelons of business India. This was no hit and run operation like the previous ones had been, this was a well planned operation that could take days to defuse. In case of all the previous blasts, except for the grieving relatives and friends, life returned pretty much to normal in a few days.Not so here. Twenty hours later, terrorists are still holed up in the hotels. People are still being held hostage. Unlike in the books and movies, these hostage dramas lack real drama - one person is not being executed every hour. Instead, the army commandos are stumbling over the bodies of the dead and injured as they try to evacuate the two places. There are explosions, and gunshots being captured on camera, but nobody knows if it is a part of the army’s tactics to flush out the terrorists, or if they are traps that had been set by the terrorists and set off by the commandos.The stock exchanges remained closed today, as were most of the offices in the area. But what about tomorrow? Or the day after? How long will the operation take? How long will the roads remain deserted? How long will the repercussions continue? How long will it take for India to recover from the potential loss of the corporate honchos stuck in the two hotels?

This is the New Face of Terror! And it looks exactly as cowardly as the previous one did.

With Ickle in a cradle next to my bed, I slept soundly – the last night of uninterrupted sleep I was to know for many months.

The first day was spent learning to be a mother- cradling, nursing, burping, massaging, changing diapers– all the things they never taught you in b-school, but without which you could not survive a single day.

Ickle was better – he knew exactly how to wrap his tiny fingers around yours, look you straight in the eye and smile. “I trust you”, he seemed to say, and you knew you would try never to let him down.

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Still only four centimeters dilated. Uncontrolled emotions. Yelling, ‘forget the baby, just get me out.’A doctor treating me like an adult. Telling me not to fight the contractions. Giving me a sedative.Dilating fast. Tying up loose ends at work, ‘don’t call back, I’m in labour.’Waters being broken. Calling the father, ‘Chuck that tea. Come right now.’Being asked if I wanted to wait for my gynec. Replying, ‘if you think I am ready, I am.’Pushing once, twice, thrice. Baby sliding out. We make a great team, he and I.

He just needs a name.

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Saturday, November 22, 2008

The snail was creeping about in the dark minding its own business when a kid spotted it. Within moments, there were five pre-schoolers jostling each other to catch a glimpse of the fabled snail. It was dark, the snail was black, and the kids were too close to a drain, so I thought it prudent to pick the snail up and move it to the lobby where there was more light.The kids crowded around, not wanting to miss a single moment of the live action that was unfolding before there eyes. A couple of older kids joined in – one rushed off to get leaves to feed the snail. The snail did not see interested, so a couple of empathetic kids rushed off to get other delicacies that the snail may prefer to the leaves.An inch long snail. A captive audience of a dozen.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Put yourself in the other man’s shoes, I was told. Strangely, I listened. And made excuses.‘He does micromanage, but that is his style, he will change.’‘She is just a kid, she doesn’t know better.’

I understand, but do not forget. They take my silence for acquiescence. Things only get worse.‘He doesn’t mean to be rude, he is just stressed.’‘She behaves like a member of the family, but she does love the kids.’When the end comes, it takes everyone by surprise but me.

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

[My father never got to take either of his grandchildren to the park, but this is exactly the kind of grandfather he would have been if he could.]

Together they take a walk in the park.

She’s still learning to walk – just putting one foot before the other is a huge challenge for her. She would fall if he lets go her hand.He holds her tight. His back may be bent, his muscles weak. But his love is so strong, he will never let her fall.

She is his future. His is a past she can be proud of. Now, he can do little else but look after her. She does not get so much attention elsewhere.

Together, they take unsteady steps. Best friends now. And forever?

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Someday, I will bound across the Savannah with you - over rocky ground and soft, through the treeless flats and thickets of shrub. Hunting dinner, chasing food - but actually celebrating a body made for running. Someday, I will run with you, we will bring our kill home together. I will be your partner, not just your child.

Someday soon, I will take my place in the herd. But not today. Today, I am young, there is a lot I have to learn. But one thing I can do well,- I can stand guard while you catch up on your sleep.

Painting by Wendy Corbett

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Monday, November 17, 2008

“Where is K for Kangaroo?”“Idhar, here!”“Very good. N for Nest?”“Pata nahin, I don’t know”“Next to M for Mango. Show me, where is M for Mango.” “Yes, now show me N for Nest.” “Very good. Aap bahut smartie ho, you are such a smart kid!”“Now, show me W for Watch?”“Here.”“Does that look like a watch to you? Show me W for Watch.”“Very good. E for Elephant?”

Me teaching the alphabet to my kids? Not at all. That’s my almost five-year old with his younger brother.How quickly they grow into their new roles!

_______Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Sunday, November 16, 2008

Entering the supermarket today, I heard an authoritative voice boom – “children not allowed here”. I naturally glanced around guiltily – I had brought both the kids to the supermarket before and had never been told of such a rule. Maybe this time I could somehow talk the security guard into allowing me to take the kids in.

But that remark had not been addressed at me at all. It was two kids, clearly of the worker class, who were being denied entry by the security guard. Their old and slightly scruffy clothes did contrast badly with the gleaming interiors the supermarket, but it did seem somewhat mean to deny them entry on those ground alone. After all, I visited the supermarket mainly because fruits and vegetables cost at least 10% less than they did at the nearest market – should people to whom that savings means a lot more than it does to me be denied the right to shop there? True, the management had the right to turn away anyone they did not deem suitable, but it somehow did not seem right either. But again, was there any guarantee that those boys would even buy anything. There must be cases of people who came only to gape and enjoy the air-conditioning, and if the presence of these people offended the sensibility of the target clientele of the supermarket, they management would feel compelled to turn them away.

But these two boys were barely ten – two days after everyone fell over backwards to make token gestures on Children’s Day, it seemed somewhat unfair to deny these boys something that was clearly a big adventure. But I was not in the frame of mind to try arguing with the security guard, so put it out of my mind and walked on.

A minute later, I saw the two boys skipping down the aisle. They knew exactly where to go and went there directly. Picking up a big box of cereals, they made for the checkout counter, paid and departed. Both were quite at home in the place, and must have invisibly visited earlier as a part of their ‘Madam’s’ entourage. It was only when they tried to enter on their own that they became visible and therefore undesirable.

I was glad they had stood up for themselves. But I still wonder how the security guard would have reacted if they had shown them a carefully hoarded ten rupee note with which they intended buying themselves a packet of potato chips. Would they still have been let in?

Saturday, November 15, 2008

My older one had been wanting to visit the Planetarium for weeks. Knowing how difficult it would be to schedule it into a normal weekend, I’d promised to take him during our week in Delhi. The big day arrived, dozens of things went wrong we reached the ticket window barely 20 minutes before the show was supposed to start. I was sure we would not get tickets, and kept trying to prepare my son for the disappointment of having to wait another day to ‘see the stars’.The lady at the ticket counter seemed not to understand what I meant when I asked if tickets were still available, but since she produced the tickets without much ado, I did not dwell too much on her apparent confusion. We ran into the Planetarium, and found ourselves surrounded by beautiful photographs of the night sky taken from various historical sites, memorabilia from Rakesh Sharma’s space visit, paintings made by children of the Chandrayan expedition, and nothing else. There was not a single person around – not even one.Minutes before the show was to begin, people started tricking in – three school kids, a man my age and his mother, a man with two kids of school going age. That’s it! Including my not yet three year old, there were exactly a dozen people in a Planetarium that could easily seat at least two hundred people.The show was beautifully executed. Complex concepts were explained in very simple language. There were things that even a self-confessed astronomy buff like me learnt for the first time. And going by some of the references, the commentary had been updated in the last month. But, there was practically nobody to see it.Malls are always crowded with people who are there only to have a good time. Why can some of those people not visit a Planetarium sometimes?

Friday, November 14, 2008

My younger one was in a festive mood yesterday. Wanted a rangoli and many pretty diyas. I gave in to his demands. He told me the colours to use, I followed his instructions faithfully. The diyas were the ones we’d bought at a school fete last year and never used.

Today, three separate people asked me which festival I celebrated yesterday. They thought I was hideing something when I said I made the decoration because I felt like it.Do we really need a reason to celebrate? Is not the fact that we are able to celebrate, reason enough to?

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Chasing butterflies. Small ones and large. Butterflies with bright yellow wings, and butterflies with dull brown ones. Butterflies stocking up on nectar, and butterflies fluttering about playing ‘catch me if you can’. Butterflies that allow themselves to be caught, and butterflies that are too canny for you.Chasing butterflies. Both literally and metaphorically. Thoughts that descend on the brain and flit out of sight the moment to try to articulate them. Ideas that keep you engrossed for hours, but nobody else seems to care a damn about.Chasing butterflies. Can anything be more fun whether you are five or seventy-fifty?

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

The Standard Chartered Mumbai marathon has spoilt me. It is so incredibly well organised that I have come to expect something close to perfection, and mismanagement like at the Airtel Delhi half-marathon leaves me feeling very very cheated. Sure the run had its highs, and in time, that is all that I will remember, but right now, the slight bitter feeling of being let down is what predominates.Small things - each very small things on their own, but things that matter a lot in the larger scheme of things.Like the plastic Airtel flags that were thrust into our hands as we entered the holding area. Did anybody seriously think that a runner would carry them for 21.097 kilometers and display them for the cameras? Some, like me, threw them into the nearest garbage bin, but many held onto them, and only discarded them en route. So 5 kilometers into the race, there was every chance that an unsuspecting runner would step on one of the plastic flags, skid, and end the race with a sprained ankle. Would it be too much to ask the event sponsors to not give out things that could be potentially dangerous to the participants of the longer race.Water stations - there was one at the 1 kilometer mark, another at the 2 kilometer mark, and a third at the 3 kilometer mark. By the time you reached the 6 kilometer mark, you were lulled into a false sense of complacency - there would be water stations at every kilometer - and you threw aside the half finished water bottle you just grabbed. But guess what? Once you hit Rajpath, there were no water stations till the 10 kilometer mark. Mercifully the sun gods were kind, but if the sun had been as bright as it should have been, I shudder to think of running down that unshaded stretch without any water. Can the participants not be told of the location of the waterstation before or during the race?The day before the race, I was talking about how the unsung heros of the Mumbai marathon were the BMC workers who ensured you never saw more than half a dozen discarded water bottles in one place. The same cannot be said for the helpers in Delhi - there were discarded water bottles all over the track, and I must have personally kicked over a hundred of them to the side so they would not hamper the participants coming after me. Perhaps that has something to do with the etiquette or lack of it in Delhi, but one could try to tell people to be a little more considerate, can't one?But the worst was reserved for the end. Soon after reaching the 17 kilometer mark, we could hear peppy music blaring out on the public address system. It rejuvenated us at a time when we needed a shot in the arm, but only till we realised that the music heralded the participants of the Great Delhi Run. To call them a mob would be an understatement - they were an inconsiderate bunch, full of their own self-importance and thought nothing of stepping on your shoes from behind and pulling them off. People tired out from the longer run just did not have the energy to jostle with the participants of the shorter run, and most just stopped running, and started walking. How difficult can it be in a city like Delhi to have separate finish lines for the two runs? The half-marathoner seeks a special kind of thrill in finishing the race - do they not deserve a place to exult?I do wish the organisers of the Delhi half-marathon learn from this experience, because the Delhi half is definitely a race I would love to run again and again.

And as I leave, here is a picture I took of the lead half-marathoners 39 minutes into the race - I was somewhere between the 5 and 6 kilometer marks at that point of time.

Monday, November 10, 2008

Eight years back, he boarded a train to Mumbai, and like so many other thirteen year olds, took up a job as a full-time ‘boy’ in someone’s house. He started off sweeping and mopping floors, washing dishes, washing and ironing clothes, and taking care of the children, but pretty soon graduated to cooking food and and managing a ‘chutta bai’. When I first met him about a year back, he was the ‘housekeeper’ of the family he worked for, and handled things like paying electricity bills, and making sure the kids did their homework on time and wore the correct uniforms to school. The people he worked for treated him well, all the kids in the apartment complex he worked in adored him, and random people called him when they needed help with changing the gas cylinder. Most people in his position would have been quite content with that, but he wanted more, much more. After a hectic day chasing after twin boys, he trained as a cameraman at night, and took lessons in fancy cooking whenever his schedule permitted.A few months back, he quit his full-time job and started working as a freelance cook. He was super-efficient and took less than an hour per house. While the other cooks struggled to work in three or four houses, he took on eight houses, and also managed to spend four hours a day working in a photo-studio. He was able to undercut the other cooks, and got more houses than even he could handle. For a couple of months, he struggled to manage so many houses – his attendance took a beating and he started losing houses. That must have forced him to do a rethink, and much better than most MBAs, he came up with an audacious business plan.While he is losing business, and is struggling to cope with the houses that he does have, instead of cutting back, he’s chosen to expand. He has employed two local ladies to work for him, and is getting three boys from his village to join him too. He’s marketed his household cooking services in most of the major Mumbai suburbs, and has in less than seven days signed up 25 new households. His employees would be cooking in those houses, and one boy is being kept as a reserve to cook in whichever house the normal crew is not able to service on a given day.If that is not ambitious enough, he has greater plans. He’s applied for a loan to buy the implements to set up a proper kitchen, to start a catering service. Cost estimates, profit margins, a marketing plan, he has it all.What about his photography business, I asked. That too, he told me, but not now. He’s open to commissions for weddings and other appointments, but is essentially going to concentrate on setting up his catering business for the next few months. Once it is able to work without too much intervention from his side, he has plans for setting up a photography business too.The White Tiger had to murder his employer before he could become an entrepreneur. My cook proves that you can dream big and aspire to live the dream even without that. Enterprise and a vision is what it really takes to get ahead.

Sunday, November 9, 2008

Nine months later, the memory is still as vivid.Me at the Mumbai half-marathon, keeping to one side because the marathoners were coming through. Head turned back to catch a glimpse of the famed African distance runners. Willing them to reach before I had to turn off, slowing down even.Then the most incredible sight ever. A pack of gazelles bounding past you. Reach out, and you could touch them. They were not humans – the human body is not engineered to run with such perfection. The Indian runner tagging along – he ran like a man. The rest were almost Divine.

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Saturday, November 8, 2008

Six years back, I was in for a rude shock when I landed in Sao Paolo, with my arrogant assumption that I can communicate with anyone anywhere. India does that to you - with English, Hindi, your mother tongue and sign language, making yourself understood is never impossible, even if it could be difficult at times.That feeling of helplessness started at the airport itself, when the immigration official found something wrong with my passport. It took a shippie from Mozambique (where they speak Portugese) who had sailed with Indians to bale me out of that mess.But things were only to get worse. The hotel I was booked into had reception staff that spoke English, but once in the room, everything was in Portugese. I wanted a drink of water, but could not find it anywhere. Went to bed thirsty, and at breakfast asked the waiter to get me a glass of water. He could not understand what I meant, and called someone else, who seemed equally inept at understanding my needs.After being offered marmalade, toast and ham, in turn, I turned to sign language. After a lot of miming, I started making headway - was offered milk, orange juice and tea bags, but no water. By then I was almost desperate. Something made me try out hydro and aqua. The latter did it. "Agua", "agua", they nodded, and got me a bottle of mineral water.Never before, or since have I felt as helpless as I did those few minutes.

Was reminded of it yesterday, when my father-in-law hosted a French tourist who did not speak a word of English. The interpreter who was accompanying him, unfortunately left, before we knew the appropriate questions to ask, and dinner was weird affair where we tried to communicate using a phase book that told you how to ask for that green dress that you wanted to try on, but not how to ask a guest if he was comfortable and if he needed anything.Then the hubby had the brilliant idea of getting google to translate for us. Our guest had landed in India without his passport, and had to stay back in Delhi till duplicate papers were issued to him. He wanted to know when breakfast would be served, and when he told him, he informed us that he did not have time. If it was not bad enough to be stuck in a strange country where he could not freely communicate with anyone, without papers and not knowing when he would get them, he had even lost his watch and did not have any concept of time. I could not even start to think of anything worse than that!We lent him a watch, and told him he could use google translate to communicate with us, before bidding him good night.The next day, after breakfast, he felt so much at home, he plonked himself on the veranda with his chess board and book, and proceeded to sun himself while doing what he seemed to enjoy doing. He even unbent enough to try and ask me what I was doing when I was trying to break open a coconut by banging it on a stone slab.It was nice to be able to make one person feel a little less hopeless.

Friday, November 7, 2008

In her new dress– technically her sister’s hand me down, but for her new. Hair done up in pretty bunches, fringe newly cut by her mother to celebrate the festive season. Standing with her mother, watching people buy the marigold garlands she spent all afternoon making.All around her are people spending more in an evening than her family makes in an entire month. They are exhausted, fatigued, just want the festival done with. Her smile lights up the street, as does her mother’s.Who is the luckier? People who have things, or people who remember what it is to smile?

__________Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Thursday, November 6, 2008

Ants scurrying around- fetching, carrying, always at work.Butterflies fluttering from plant to plant– bright wings so attractive to a child’s mind.Ladybugs with spots that you can count- sometimes you call them ladybirds.Bees that buzz as they fly around- they make honey, but stay far away as they sting.Mosquitos that spread diseases when they bite- you can swot them as much as you want.

Spiders with eight legs and as many eyes– they spin webs, but you never see then do so. But spiders don’t count- they are not insects after all.

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

[I have always been fascinated by photographs of baby elephants taking their first steps - there is something so universal in that bond between mother and child]

You try to take a step and nearly fall. You can’t understand why you need to walk at all. But, baby, there is a whole world out there, waiting to be explored. There are places to go, vistas to see. Unless you learn to walk, how will you ever make this world your own?I know you feel you will never learn. But that is what I am here for – to assure you it can be done, and it can be done by you.The first steps are the hardest, but when I am there, you will never walk alone.

______Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

‘The Darkest Hour’, they call it. For once, ‘they’ are right.The black sea blends into the horizon. The lights on the ship are turned off. I am alone on the deck.Alone in the featureless void. One spark of consciousness in the darkness. The Universe centers around me.The Universe! Grander, more majestic than our mind could ever comprehend. How small I am in comparison, how insignificant!Yet, I comprehend the idea of the Universe. I am the Universe, the Universe is me.I am Insignificant, Infinite.

Dawn breaks, the day begins. Tomorrow, I will commune with God again.

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Monday, November 3, 2008

The elevator made an unscheduled stop, I saw a rangoli that took my breath away. Vast in scope and execution, I could just imagine how magical it must have looked at night.I thought I knew the lady by face, but even if not, I just had to tell her how much I appreciated her work.I called. And behind her polite “Thank you” was a pause that almost screamed, ‘and now that it is out of the way, what do you really want from me?’Times must be bad if a pure act of appreciation is met with suspicion.

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Lakshmi, the Goddess of Wealth and Prosperity. Lakshmi, the Beautiful, the Ethereal. Lakshmi, who turns everything she touches into gold. Lakshmi, who showers blessings on everyone who worships her. Lakshmi, who does not discriminate in the favours she bestows on her followers. Lakshmi, who leaves happiness in her wake. Lakshmi, who gives you everything money can buy and teaches you be content with that.When a girl is born, they say Lakshmi has come home. When a bride enters her new house, Lakshmi enters with her.This Lakshmi sells Lakshmis for a living. Why then does she look so sad?

Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.

Saturday, November 1, 2008

Every morning, my grandmother would step outside, bend down, and let her fingers fly inches above the freshly-washed floor. A minute later, she would straighten up– her kolam done. A perfectly symmetrical pattern drawn with rice powder around a grid of dots. ‘All is well at home’, it would proclaim.On Fridays, the kolams would be more elaborate, but it was on festive occasions that her creativity would really flow – elephants, peacocks, abstract motifs, all drawn around standard patterns of dots.I attempted my first kolam last year, and soon became an expert. Tradition flows even if you deny it.

_____Drabble (n) - an extremely short work exactly one hundred words in length. The purpose of the drabble is brevity and to test the author's ability to express interesting and meaningful ideas in an extremely confined space.